


listen closely and the sea will sing your name

by Astrie



Category: Flight Rising
Genre: Dragons, Gen, Original Character(s), POV First Person, the black sands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-05
Updated: 2019-06-05
Packaged: 2020-04-08 04:49:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19100062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Astrie/pseuds/Astrie
Summary: i wish you could have seen our home when the air was charged with magic. these sands used to glitter with a radiant power, the kind that sends bursts of light down your back. but it's all gone now, and we didn't even get so much of a warning- it was so slow, that we barely noticed what was happening until it was far, far too late. migrating birds stopped arriving. the sky grew paler. our seer's visions from the tidelord were becoming cloudier, dimmer, until one morning she woke up and saw nothing at all.(this is the introduction to the lore of the black sands! start reading here)





	listen closely and the sea will sing your name

**Author's Note:**

> this is a slightly edited and touched of version of my hatchery's introductory lore. if you've already read it there, you need not read it again here. if you're new, welcome, i hope you enjoy my stories!

your eyes sting with salt and you rub them. are you sure this is the right way?

...

just as the doubt fades from your awareness you see it; an expanse of black sand looms before you, gentle, and unbothered by your gaze.

you feel confused. you could swear this beach wasn't there a moment ago, only fog, rocks, and little black crabs that didn't seem to like you.

you figure you must have been simply mistaken, and your thoughts are interrupted again when a coatl approaches you from the small spattering of dragons milling about. her eyes are friendly and seem amused by your sudden appearance and look of unfamiliarity. she invites you to rest with her by the ocean and you accept, suddenly aware of the gnawing aches in your legs. she settles into comfortable rest, and coos a story to you.

_i wish you could have seen our home when the air was charged with magic. these sands used to glitter with a radiant power, the kind that sends bursts of light down your back. but it's all gone now, and we didn't even get so much of a warning- it was so slow, that we barely noticed what was happening until it was far, far too late. migrating birds stopped arriving. the sky grew paler. our seer's visions from the tidelord were becoming cloudier, dimmer, until one morning she woke up and saw nothing at all._

_alesant howled for days without pause. her voice turned ran afraid to desperate to ragged, tearing the fog, echoing against a lonely ocean who had no reply to give her._

_we were silent. our leader's fear was seeping into our own hearts. her cries rattled our bones at night whilst we tried for something one could pass off as sleep. each of us wore a mask of calmness- not for ourselves, but for everybody else._

_life was that way for nearly ten years. until but a claw's grasp of months ago... imogen, our lorekeeper, he was shocked when the words of consolation and reason he had offered every single day for the past ten years were suddenly met with snarling eyes. alesant vaulted forward, throwing herself into the air. though they were fluid and powerful there was no grace behind her movements; she was shaking slightly, as if the strain of the motion was too much for her, as if she was being animated and forced to do things her body cannot do without breaking under its own pressure. alesant hit the surface of the water at a direct angle, a perfect dive._

the coatl exhales a heavy breathe. you raise your head and notice a stillness to the air that you hadn't before.

_the vanishing of alesant violently tore away the shell of normalcy we had grown during those years, the years when we thought we were untouchabe. our new leader, ira, was left sleepless in his efforts to comfort his clan. ira is a pragmatist, and to him, the most valuable solution is the most grounded one, the one that accounts for all scenarios. in this way, his way of thinking is dramatically different from how alesant thought, as alesant had a heart full of conviction and faith. she grieved for every death in the clan, even the loss of an unhatched egg._

_those were especially hard._

_alesant believes- believed, the black sands to be a place of unspeakable value, of, in her words, primordial sacredness. that children born here are fundamentally connected to our tidelord, that their souls are bonded. so much so that many are born carrying the colors of their home._

and it was true that dragons from the black sands have an unnaturally vivid affinity for magic.

_alesant's fear was that those connections would be severed if the children were allowed to leave the sands before they grew up. and so, she forbade just that._

_but now the nestmothers are afraid. if.... if we were to take what was happening to us as omens... could our tidelord be gone? if he was, who is watching us? protecting us? was he asleep?_

_or...drown the thought........._

_dead?_

_ira swore to them he would find a way to ease their hearts. if the future and safety of the black sands were no longer assured, we must consider the unimaginable, and turn outward. this would mean entrusting the care of the clan's hatchlings to dragons hailing from completely foreign regions of sorneith. it was hard. many couldn't come to terms with the truth of it. during that time many of our beloved clanmates left, either on their own, or with other clans, thinning out our numbers greatly._

_we've sent out letters to those we call our friends, and trusted them to spread whispers. they have- it seems the very existence of this land has become something of a legend. we provided them no directions, and they understand what that means. even if you're able to figure out that we straddle the border of water flight and fire flight, and then find the exact right stretch of coastline, the fog surrounding our home confuses the senses of any outsider who seeks to harm. if you found the black sands you must have been, in some way, destined to._

_that's why you're here, isn't it? to take one of our young away from the eye of the storm? perhaps you are. your path in life is nothing for me to take up concern with. all i offer you today is an invitation: to stay a while and listen. listen to the waves, the wind, the dragons, all along the crags of cooled lava and along the sandbars beyond the fog you can find them.... each has a soul full of stories._

_**i can feel your wild sense of curiosity and longing stirring.**_

__

_**they are waiting for you.** _

**Author's Note:**

> as i write this, i have some short stories in the works that will go up soon! but still, a primer is super important, and that's what this is meant to be.  
> in the future when those are posted, they're meant to be read in any order after you've read this! i hope you take lieb's advice and stick around for em
> 
> also, the hatchery i mentioned at the top is here: http://www1.flightrising.com/forums/baz/2667227


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